Race and Racism

Arabs are portrayed as negative figures in many films such as: True Lies, Back to the Future, and Raiders of the Lost Ark. Also computer games often feature cartoon Arab villains in which children rack up high scores and win games by killing Arabs. Ethnic stereotypes are especially harmful in the absence of positive ethnic images. Arabs are "hardly ever seen as ordinary people, practicing law, driving taxis, singing lullabies or healing the sick”(Wingfield and Karaman). After September 11th when the Twin Towers were attack, Arabs and Arab- Americans were are considered to be terrorist. In almost all films that Arabs played a role in and prayed their prayer was followed by violence.

Timeline

1970

February 21: A P.F.L.P. splinter group detonates altitude bombs in two airplanes, causing one to crash while the other lands safely. Forty-seven people are killed, and both the P.F.L.P. and other Palestinian guerrilla organizations condemn the attacks.

July 22: Two days before a couple of P.F.L.P. members are to go on trial in Greece, six others hijack an Olympic Airways flight from Beirut to Athens. After landing in Greece, they threaten to blow up the plane unless their comrades (and five others already convicted) are released. Although the Israelis now refuse to negotiate with hijackers, the Greek government agrees to the deal. Emboldened by this success, the P.F.L.P. plots its most dramatic skyjacking operation yet.

September 8: President Richard Nixon assembles his advisers to discuss the American response. He later phones Secretary of Defense Melvin Laird and instructs him to bomb the P.F.L.P. positions, but Laird claims the weather is not favorable for an air strike. Laird will later say that, with American troops still in Vietnam, he was opposed to any military action and used the weather as an excuse.

September 9: With the P.F.L.P.'s deadline soon to expire, three militants skyjack a British BOAC plane with 105 passengers and nine crew members while en route from Bahrain to London. After the plane lands at Revolution Airport, the P.F.L.P. extends the deadline for meeting its demands until Sunday, September 13. Meanwhile, in Amman Palestinian fighters have been battling Hussein's troops just outside the hotel where the freed hostages are staying; Jordanian forces are finally able to get them safely out of the country.

September 10: Nixon begins to ratchet up the U.S. response, putting the 82nd Airborne division on "semialert" and flying transport planes to Turkey where they can help in any evacuation of Americans. The next day elements of the U.S. Sixth Fleet also leave port to assist in operations.

September 16: Heavy fighting breaks out between Jordanian troops and P.L.O. guerrillas, and for the next ten days civil war rages in Jordan. The Nixon administration, while determined to keep Hussein in power, also wants to avoid a wider war or anything that might tip the balance of power between the U.S. and the Soviet Union in the region. Crisis seems imminent when Syrian tanks cross into Jordan, leading to calls for an armed Israeli response. But Egyptian President Nasser summons Arafat and Hussein to Cairo and brokers a settlement. The next day Nasser dies of a heart attack, but his agreement holds, and by the end of the month all the remaining airplane hostages will have been released, as will be Khaled and her six P.F.L.P. colleagues held in European jails. Palestinian militants dub the events of this month "Black September," and a new wave of guerrillas press on with their struggle.

1973October 6-22: Egypt and Syria launch a surprise attack on Israel, which initially suffers heavy losses. An American airlift of military supplies helps turn the tide, and by the time a ceasefire takes effect on October 22, Israel has taken territory on the western side of the Suez Canal and areas of Syria beyond the Golan Heights. In response to American support of Israel, Saudi Arabia leads an oil embargo that will last until March 1974.

1974 Israel reaches agreements with Egypt and Syria that lead to the establishment of demilitarized zones and a partial Israeli withdrawal. Arafat speaks at the U.N. while wearing a pistol, but says he is also "bearing an olive branch"; the P.L.O. is granted observer status in the General Assembly.

1977Anwar Sadat, who had taken power in Egypt after Nasser's death, comes to Jerusalem and addresses the Israeli parliament.

1978 President Jimmy Carter hosts Sadat and Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin at Camp David, Maryland, producing a series of accords that lead to peace between the two states. In a March 1979 treaty, Egypt recognizes Israel's right to exist and Israel agrees to withdraw from the Sinai Peninsula.

1981 October 6: Anwar Sadat is assassinated by members of a militant Islamic organization opposed to Egypt's peace with Israel.

1982

June 6: Israel invades Lebanon, forcing the P.L.O. to relocate to Tunis. American troops will be stationed in Lebanon as peacekeepers late in the year. Israel will withdraw from the majority of Lebanese territory it has occupied by 1985, but it will hold onto a buffer strip until 2000.

1983

April 18: A suicide bomber destroys the U.S. Embassy in Beirut. Fifty-seven people are killed, including 17 Americans.

October 23: A suicide bomber kills 241 U.S. Marines stationed in Beirut.

1987

December: The first Palestinian "intifada," or uprising, begins against Israeli troops in Gaza, soon spreading to the West Bank. Demonstrators throw stones and stage civil disobedience; by the time it ends in 1993, more than a thousand Palestinians will have died.

1988

The P.L.O. announces that it is the government in exile of a Palestinian state and recognizes Israel's right to exist. The U.S. begins discussions, but Israel refuses to participate.

1991

The first Gulf War results in the expulsion of Iraqi troops from Kuwait. The P.L.O., which had backed Iraq's invasion, is excluded from a U.S.-organized peace conference held in Madrid. Israel is pressured by the U.S. to attend.

1993

President Bill Clinton supports the Oslo accords between the P.L.O. and Israel, which culminate in an agreement between Arafat and Israeli Prime Minister Yitzak Rabin and a historic handshake on the White House lawn. As part of the agreement, the P.L.O. renounces terrorism and Israel agrees to limited Palestinian sovereignty in parts of Gaza and the West Bank. Additional agreements will expand areas under Palestinian control in the coming years.

Arafat, who has been allowed to establish his headquarters in Gaza, is elected president of the Palestinian Authority. Over the next few years, the Palestinians and Israelis will attempt to build on the Oslo accords, but progress is hampered by violence from both sides.

2000

President Clinton tries, and fails, to engineer another Israeli-Palestinian agreement. A visit by Israeli opposition leader Ariel Sharon to the Temple Mount in Jerusalem sparks a second intifada. The coming years will feature both renewed bloodshed and halting steps towards Palestinian self-rule and eventual statehood.

Stereotypes

Arabs are a main ethnic group of people affected by numerous stereotypes. Some stereotypes are "Arabs are more prone to violence, they're backward, they keep their women down, they're oppressive, and they have no democracy" (Metz). Hollywood filmmakers portray Arabs as romantic sheiks or heartless villains. The stereotype about all Arabs being terrorist comes into play when Arabs are at the airport. At the airport all Arabs are usually searched farther than other ethnic groups and interrogated, Also "Americans who looked Middle Eastern were harassed, assaulted and their property vandalized in a wave of misplaced retaliation (Weston)."